NOLAGuide
The Best Restaurants & Bars In The Bywater & Marigny
photo credit: Jillian Greenberg
Just east of the French Quarter is where you'll find the Marigny and Bywater, two neighborhoods that are definitely more low-key than their neighbor to the west. These two areas are filled with plenty of bars and restaurants, many of which are frequented by more locals than visitors, and it’s easy to get around by foot or bike. You'll find a few great cafes, late-night music spots, a wine garden utopia, and more.
We also have guides to the best restaurants and bars in New Orleans.
THE SPOTS
photo credit: Cory Fontenot
Bywater American Bistro, a spot that does Cajun, Caribbean, Creole, and Southern dishes, is just steps away from one of the best views in the city at Crescent Park. While you can’t go wrong with sitting inside the industrial-meets-cozy dining room, the best option is to grab a spot at the high top just outside the front door. From there, you can watch the world pass by while trying blackened octopus, arancini with paddlefish caviar, and wagyu beef lasagna. As the younger sister restaurant to the equally popular (but a little fancier) Compere Lapin, this place regularly fills up with both visitors from around the world and neighbors from down the block—all of whom will happily give you their personal recs of where to grab a few drinks after dinner.
Paladar 511 is a loud, fun place to have a group dinner where you can let loose at one of the big leather booths that face the open kitchen and not worry about being too unhinged. The menu is all about pizza, pastas, and hearty sauces—make sure to get the messy-but-worth-it Farm Egg pizza and squid ink spaghetti with calabrian chili butter that we’d happily buy by the jar. Save room for dessert, because the warm tahini brownie is the only thing your friends will be shouting about after they try it.
You can find this fun wine bar inside a small house on St. Claude. They have a great selection of natural wines and a reservations-only, 10-course tasting menu that’s full of surprising dishes in a dining room reminiscent of a friend’s cozy apartment. The menu is always rotating, but think fermenting, braising, smoking, poaching—anything that can be done to get the most out of seasonal, local produce (a recent favorite featured prawns served with fermented tomato). If you can’t make reservations and the weather’s nice, stop by for some wine and snacks on the first-come, first-served garden patio.
What started as a semi-secret pop-up between two college friends from New York now consistently makes some of the best pizza in the city. The crust has that nice little snap when you fold it, and the toppings never overwhelm the simplicity of the red sauce. You can order by the slice, but it’s also imperative that you get their excellent margherita, which only comes as a whole pie. Look for a rotating list of specials, too, like the roasted cauliflower, hot coppa with caramelized onions, or rosemary potato with spicy bechamel. And don’t forget to pick up a salted chocolate chip cookie for dessert.
photo credit: N7
Eating at N7 feels like you’re in on a secret. It’s located on a random side street in the Bywater, has almost no signage, and unless you knew otherwise, you’d think it was just a swanky house that hosted a lot of outdoor dinner parties. They serve a mix of French and Japanese dishes, along with a variety of canned seafood, and have an extensive wine and cocktail menu. But it’s the combination of great food, the Christmas light-covered garden patio, and the sense that you stumbled upon something undiscovered that makes N7 such a special spot.
At the far end of the Bywater, you’ll find Bacchanal, a weird little wine shop that evolved into a wine garden utopia and one of the coolest places you can spend a night in New Orleans. After you pick out a bottle, head outside to the big backyard where you can drink, order food, and catch live music every night of the week. There’s also a semi-secret cocktail and wine bar upstairs, which is the perfect place to take in the scene and survey the backyard for available seats.
Morrow’s has a huge menu of soul food dishes, along with a few things that combine Southern and Korean food. Stick with the latter to have the best experience here, like a glorious bowl of gumbo ramen that’s loaded with andouille sausage and plump shrimp. It’s a great option for a late weeknight dinner (they’re open until 10pm during the week), where you can sit at the bar or one of their hightop tables and slurp kimchi broth while listening to Rihanna.
photo credit: Rush Jagoe
A food hall located inside a restored building from the 1800s, St. Roch Market brings together a wide range of local vendors that serve things like oysters, Vietnamese food, charcuterie, fresh pastries, cocktails, and more. It’s a great place to check out for brunch or lunch before exploring the Marigny, or if you’re with a group and everyone just happens to be in the mood for something different.
photo credit: Jakob Layman
There’s a chance you’ve woken up thinking, “Things really went sideways last night after that third hurricane last night.” When that happens, head east to Elizabeth’s. This place is famous for its huge breakfast and brunch dishes, like eggs Florentine topped with fried oysters and sweet potato duck hash over a cornbread waffle, along with their praline bacon. They also serve really solid cocktails, like a morning margarita and brandy milk punch—no hurricanes in sight.
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Summers in New Orleans are brutal, and when you need a break from bar hopping or just want to relax for a bit near water, head to The Country Club. You can eat crab beignets or have some filet mignon at the restaurant inside the 200-year-old house, but the real reason to come here is to hang out by the big pool in the backyard, where you can still order food, but also swim or just lay around. If you come on the weekend though, be prepared for Drag Brunch at 10am and 1pm on Saturdays and Sundays, which is exactly as fun—and as popular with bachelorette parties—as you’d expect.
photo credit: Brugh Foster
New Orleans isn't exactly known for their barbecue. But just like when you end up singing karaoke with a stranger or learning that you actually like absinthe, this city has a habit of delivering the unexpected, and that’s what you get at The Joint. This barbecue spot just a few blocks from Bacchanal serves all of the classics, but ribs and sausage are what they do best, and make sure to grab a slice of peanut butter pie, too.
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Satsuma Cafe is here for you when you want something green, fresh, and not cooked in butter. When you hit that wall, Satsuma Cafe is here for you. This small Bywater cafe serves breakfast and lunch daily and is the place to go for fresh juices, salads, and avocado toast. That said, they also have a great bacon, egg, and cheese, in case richness fatigue hasn’t set in yet. They get mobbed on the weekends, but if you come early enough, grab a seat on their garden patio.
photo credit: Cory Fontenot
Located right in the middle of the Marigny, Flora Cafe checks off everything you’d want from a neighborhood coffee shop. Local artwork on the walls? Yes. Good coffee and affordable breakfast and lunch food served all day? Confirmed. A cat that wanders around the shop, but isn’t overly friendly? You get the idea. They stay open until 10pm daily, so basically anytime you need a coffee or a snack, Flora Cafe is a good option.
There are two good times to go to Dat Dog. The first is before a night out when you want to drink a few beers, enjoy one of their many delicious sausages, and look out over Frenchmen Street as people start to filter in for the night. The other time is a few hours later, when it’s after 1am on a weekend and nothing in the world sounds better than a crawfish etouffee-covered bratwurst. Either is fine and regardless of what hour it is, you’re going to be very pleased with your decision.
photo credit: The Elysian Bar
The Elysian Bar is one of the coziest and most romantic bars in New Orleans. The 19th-century Creole cottage-style dining parlor has beautiful high ceilings, but the place you want to be is the “jewel box” bar located in the atrium. The room is very yellow and it feels like you’ve stumbled upon somebody’s secret study where an old-timey baron might smoke a pipe and entertain some friends. Come for an early evening cocktail, like the Mr. Follow Follow that’s both spicy and pleasantly banana-y, and snack on small bites like BBQ pecans and salmon toast.
Almost every place on Frenchmen hosts live music each night and it’s easy enough to just bar hop up and down the street until you find one you like. Blue Nile is one of your best options though. On any given night, you can hear funk, blues, jazz, or brass, depending on when you stop by. It can get pretty packed inside since they tend to host the bigger brass bands, but this place also has a large balcony on the second floor where you can still hear the music and drink, but without being stuck in the crowd.
In recent years, New Orleans has seen a lot of new craft breweries pop up, but our favorite is Parleaux Beer Lab. This brewery-meets-beer garden is located at the far end of the Bywater, near The Joint and Bacchanal, and, along with serving plenty of seasonal beers, it hosts different food trucks most nights of the week. Stop by for a few brews and some food, or you can even catch a free yoga class here in the morning.
photo credit: Cory Fontenot
The Apple Barrel on Frenchmen Street looks like the blueprint for any “New Orleans-style bar.” There’s random artwork of musicians, money is stapled to the wall above the bar, and everything sort of looks secondhand. But it’s also one of the most low-key bars on the street, and since it’s smaller than the rest, the shows here feel way more intimate than anywhere else on Frenchmen.
